Don't look down on short people!

I never knew that the Armed Forces of the Philippines had a minimum height requirement. It seems odd that one had to be a certain height to be a soldier and fight a war. Apparently, the former minimum height requirement for men was five feet and four inches, and five feet two inches for women. Now, the AFP is lowering the bar to five feet for both genders. How politically correct of them!

The idea is to attract more recruits with technical skills such as carpentry, masonry, computer techies and the like. The armed forces, after all, are more than just battling insurgents. They are very much involved in socio-civic activities and projects as well. We won't even discuss the more nefarious activities of those who have forgotten their oath to protect the citizenry, and have become scoundrels in uniform. But I digress.

In other words, those not blessed with height will be relegated to more non-combat duties. After all, height is might. I beg to disagree. Height is not necessarily always an advantage in combat. In some cases it is more an asset.

During the Vietnam War, the Americans had to deal with the Viet Cong and their numerous underground tunnels. Whole systems of these tunnels were dug out by the Viet Cong, to serve as supply channels to and from different locations. They also served as homes and hospitals to many fighters. And probably the most effective use of these tunnels, were as traps for the unsuspecting GI. Now these tunnels were small, since the average height of a Vietnamese was no more than an average Filipino. Since Americans were generally tall, they just could not fit into these tunnels. This led to the necessity of having a small and thin men, to be able to enter these tunnels and neutralize them in any way they could. They were aptly called the "Tunnel Rats".

In World War II, tankers were generally small to be able to fit comfortably into their vehicles, and exit as fast as they could as the situation called for it. And the most famous short military figure of them all, Napoleon Bonaparte. Although he was in reality around five feet seven inches in height, he was always portrayed as a man of short stature. Some argue that this was more an insult by the British in portraying him short. Nonetheless, he was arguably the most famous French military leader in history, notwithstanding that he was a tyrant.

Short people have always been on the short end of the stick, if you can pardon the pun. They have been seen as inefficient, unskilled, inadequate, undisciplined and generally wanting. There is always that tacit disrespect for short people. Unfair, absolutely. But we need not look far to see how a short person seems to disprove all of that. The ability to cling on to power, in spite of all her shortcomings, despite being the most unpopular president in the country's history, is by no means a small feat. Pun sarcastically intended.